state of grace
by alinaandalion
Summary: This is who they are now, and after everything that has happened, it's starting to feel like they're moving forward. Spoilers for "The (Very) Big Bird Job."


"_Any moment now she would open herself up, reveal to him the essential thing, the hidden thing at the core of her life, or of her life, or of his life—the thing he was longing to know. The thing he'd always wanted."_

_ - Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood_

* * *

**I. **_Day Four, Night_

Nate isn't surprised when he walks into his house and finds Sophie curled up on the leather couch he just bought the day before. She doesn't turn to look at him but pours a small measure of whiskey in the empty glass on his coffee table.

"I was starting to wonder if you were going to come home at all," she says evenly as he rounds the couch and plucks the glass from her hand.

He takes a brief swallow of the smooth liquid, feels the burn at the back of his mouth. "I didn't know I would have you waiting on me."

Shaking her head, Sophie picks her own glass up from the other side of the bottle and takes a languid sip. "You didn't ask how I got past a locked door."

"Well, that's not a real mystery, is it?" He smiles and finishes his drink.

She purses her lips, looking away. She doesn't respond, and he takes the time to study the tired slope of her shoulders, the light playing over her dark hair. He can feel the inevitable pull towards her but resists it for now.

Sophie has her own place, situated a little closer to their new Portland headquarters than his house, but he knows that she will probably spend more time here than at her own home. He's never asked, but he wonders sometimes if her unwillingness to go home alone is linked back to when she stood in her apartment, a bomb hidden inside a vase of pretty flowers held in her hands.

The thing is, he knows her. And so he knows that what Sophie is afraid of isn't finding death waiting on her doorstep but that moment after she picks it up and has to wait for someone to come to her rescue, to notice that she is missing and something isn't right while she stands helpless to save herself.

He also knows better than to ever mention this thought to her.

He is pulled back to the present when Sophie turns her head to look at him, a brilliant smile on her face as she dangles a set of two keys from her fingers. She gets to her feet smoothly and walks to him.

"You seemed a little busy the past couple of days," she murmurs into his ear, placing the keys into his shirt pocket with deft fingers.

Then she pulls her shirt over her head and gazes up at him, eyes blazing with purpose. Grinning, Nate places his hands gently on her waist and strokes his thumbs against her soft skin.

"I don't exactly have a bed set up," he says as he pulls her closer and presses his hips into hers. "But I do have a mattress on the floor upstairs."

Rolling her eyes, Sophie kisses him and he wonders again how he survived six months without her.

* * *

**II. **_Day One, Afternoon_

"Do you like the place?"

Sophie turns at the sound of Nate's voice, trailing her fingers over the back of one of the chairs, shivering slightly at the fact he is standing only a few feet away after watching him leave on a boat and pretending for six months that she didn't miss him.

"I like this," she says slowly. "But I still don't like Portland. I wasn't expecting to move here permanently."

"It can't be that bad," Nate replies with an easy grin. "At least you already have a place to live. I have to settle for a hotel room for the next couple of days."

"Well, that's your fault for deciding that we could pull off a con with no prep work." Her shoulders slump when she thinks about all the work they still have left to do before the morning; she had sincerely believed for once that Nate might be able to relax for a little while before jumping back into the game.

As always, it seems that Nathan Ford lives to prove her wrong.

"Sorry about that," he murmurs, suddenly right behind her, his hands resting firmly on her waist.

"You don't sound very apologetic," she tells him lightly even as she presses back against him and considers how long they have until the other three come back.

His lips brush past a sensitive spot on her neck, and he says, "How can I make it up to you?"

The slight flick of his tongue against her skin is her breaking point, and Sophie turns quickly into him, kissing him furiously, her teeth sinking into his bottom lip and tugging until he groans and pushes her back, back, and she feels the wall press against her spine.

She doesn't have enough patience to drag this out, and they're working on borrowed time anyway since the other three might show up at any moment, so she slips her hands underneath Nate's shirt, scrapes her nails against his stomach and unfastens his belt. He slicks his mouth along her neck, teeth pressing in just enough to make her arch up into him and moan softly at how _right_ it feels.

"I thought about you while I was out there," he says huskily as his hands push her dress up over her hips and trace the line of her underwear.

Sophie smiles up at him and slips her fingers inside his pants, stroking the length of him. "That's funny. I didn't think about you at all."

"Liar," he teases, but then she twists her wrist and he groans, falling into her so that his weight presses her even more against the wall, so heavy and warm.

"You know me," she replies as she switches to a slow rhythm and bucks her hips into his slack fingers.

His eyes go wide, so impossibly _blue_ that her breath catches in her throat, and he kisses her; his tongue pushes into her mouth as he slides a finger inside her, and she can suddenly barely breathe, it's so much _more_ than she expected it to be.

* * *

**III. **_Day Six, Morning_

There's a moment when Nate wakes up and reaches out to the right side of the mattress to find only crumpled sheets that he almost panics; he opens his eyes and takes a deep breath, his searching gaze finally landing on Sophie curled up on her window seat. Propping himself up on his elbows, he blinks blearily and allows himself the luxury of staring. His eyes trace over her high cheekbones, shadowed eyes, a small bruise where her neck slopes into shoulder, long legs.

"It's raining," she says without looking at him, her fingers pressing against the fogged glass and leaving behind five distinct fingerprints as she stands and walks back to the bed.

"How long have you been awake?"

She shrugs and climbs back into the bed. "Not that long. It's still pretty early."

He shifts closer to her and tugs on her arm until she curls into him, resting her head on his chest. Her breath whispers across his skin and as he listens to the rain hit the window in a staccato beat, he drifts between sleep and waking.

"Are you still upset about moving here?" he asks after awhile, threading his fingers through her dark hair.

Throwing one of her legs over his hips and lifting herself above him, Sophie looks at him with dark eyes that give nothing away. He reaches up, cups his right hand around the back of her neck, pulls her down to kiss her.

She turns away at the last moment and presses her mouth close to his ear. "I don't like the rain. But I'm happy about the rest of it."

He cranes his neck to press his mouth against hers, and when he rolls them so he's above her, pressing her down into the mattress, her smile is so beautiful that he doesn't miss the sun.


End file.
